Friday, December 2, 2016

A recent photo assignment involved shooting several flower arrangements by the Virginia-based floral designer Binaifer Davar. She has a website at here and wanted to add new photos of some of her recent designs.

Binaifer has trained at the Judith Blacklock Flower School in London, and is a contributing writer for Blacklock’s The Flower Arrangermagazine.
In 2009, Binaifer was selected as one of 12 semi-finalists for Chief
Flower Designer for the Obama White House. She is based in Falls
Church, Virginia and provides flower designs to clients throughout
the Washington, DC metropolitan area.

This was a challenging assignment but I think the results speak for themselves.

You can contact Binaifer (pronounced "Bin-EYE-fer") by email here: binaifer at aol dot com (note that I no longer post actual email addresses because nowadays "webbots" scan everything on the web looking for emails in the typical "name@domain.com" format for spamming purposes.)

Wednesday, February 10, 2016

Today, I rented a great little mountain bike to take a ride through the Piñones forest on a beach and boardwalk trail through the woods. Robert, owner of San Juan Bike Rentals (http://sanjuanbikerental.com/), has a great little business going where he delivers bikes, helmets, locks and a handlebar bag direct to your hotel/condo building. If you remember, last year I rented a rusty old clunker for this ride, but Robert's bike was a nearly new ProdecoTec X3 V3 mountain bike.

Me and my mountain bike

The Pinones trail starts at Punta Cangrejob, a cape east of the town of Loiza. The trail winds through ramshackle bars and outdoor eateries like the one seen below that look abandoned during the week but are lifely during the weekends.

La Casa del Miami Vice,

The first views of the trail are of the ocean beaches.

Beach View from the trail

The trail passes through thick forest on the right, more beaches, then turns sharply into the woods. It was very hot and I only stopped when I heard or saw birds, so I have no photos of the woods themselves.

Beach-side boardwalk section of trail

Once in the woods, I did see a few examples of local wildlife. Puerto Rico is not known for a great deal of wildlife, but I photograph what I do see.

Northern Mockingbird

This mockingbird has a great call, actually, many calls, and when I heard him, I was looking high in the trees trying to find him. After a few moments I noticed he was on a branch literally 30 feet away, in full view, and didn't move as I brought out the camera and began to take some shots. If you have sound, you can hear samples of these calls here: http://ibc.lynxeds.com/audio/play/251213

Northern Mockingbird

This blue lizard appeared quickly as I rounded a turn, and skittered off the trail. I was able to get a few quick shots before he was gone.

Blue-Tailed Almeiva Ground Lizard

Blue-Tailed Almeiva Ground Lizard

At first I thought this was a mourning dove, but on closer inspection, it is a Zenaida dove, named after the wife of the 19th century French ornithologist, Charles Lucien Bonaparte, nephew of the Emperor Napoleon. UPDATED: CORRECTION Turns out this is a common ground dove on further inspection. Sorry, so no story about Bonaparte.

Zenaida Dove CORRECTION: Common Ground Dove

Tomorrow, we're off to the Barefoot Travelers B and B on the east side of the island for the night then an early morning walk through the Humacão Nature Reserve.

Sunday, February 7, 2016

The big snow of 2016 had pretty much come and gone by the time we departed on our comfortable Jet Blue flight early on a Wednesday morning, but the prospect of warm ocean breezes in a lush tropical paradise made it very easy to forget that "Snowzilla 2016" had ever happened at all.Upon arrival on the island, as you disembark from your aircraft, you can't wait to peel away the sweaters and long sleeves of the colder northern climes to adjust to the sudden rush of warm humid air in the jetway and the blazing sunlight of a tropical afternoon. Ah, Puerto Rico, my heart's devotion...two weeks to unwind, reinvigorate, and explore the sights and sounds and tastes, both old and new.The image above is the view from our balcony room over Isla Verde Beach. The following images are a collection from our first few days.

Sunday, November 8, 2015

So we were given a wonderful warm day this past Friday to get out and enjoy the lake and many of us did. Barges and kayaks, hydrocycles and bass boats, I saw them all.I took the kayak out for a last look at our fall colors and shot these photographs for everyone's enjoyment. Let's hope winter stays away as long as possible.

Friday, October 2, 2015

Before all the rain, photographed some songbirds in the front garden enjoying the day, including the birdbath.Here's a Carolina wren in the birdbath:

A chickadee patiently waiting his turn:

Bluejay about to go for a drink:

Chickadee with a big seed:

Nuthatch in a typical pose:

Hairy woodpecker:

And, if you didn't have a chance to see this video, here it is again. This is a very rare pairing, to me: a black-throated blue warbler and a female redstart visited the birdbath. It happened so fast, it was all I could do but grab my iPhone and take a quick video.I've loaded it below but you can also view it at this link: https://vimeo.com/140829886

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Welcome

Photography by J. Larry Golfer from around the world and around the neighborhood, with a sprinkling of occasional illustrated recipes by "Chef Lars." Get updates by subscribing with your email address above or post a comment after any posting. See more of my photographic work here at my website, with a link back to this blog.

About Me

I've been a photographer for over 40 years, as a pro, enthusiast and hobbyist starting with my first Kodak Brownie camera back in 1961. In 1970, I got my first SLR, a Minolta SRT-101 and shot mainly black and white film until I moved to digital in 2001. Photography has been my passion. I take commercial assignments and shoot both color and black and white, whether it be corporate and residential decor art photography, travel, wildlife, portraits, real estate or events. I've been trained at Glen Echo Photoworks, Inversnaid (Scotland) Photography Workshops, Maine Photographic Workshops, but am mainly self taught.

Contact me to inquire about purchasing prints or notecards, or for any of your photographic needs, from portraits and headshots to commercial and family events. Send me an email to: lgolfer2@gmail.com

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